Changing Lanes 10: Dance with the Devil

[Benji]

Well we are all forgetting the fact that Brandon did cut off the conversation and the call with Chase as he was about to tell him something else about Eric when he is drunk on tequila.

 

I'm going have to say that it has to be about the conversation that Eric and Chase had way back when (hopefully this isn't a spoiler to anyone, but if you haven't read LTMP, then STOP!!!)

Eric admitted that he had a crush or the hots for Brandon to Chase.

.

 

In a perfect world (unfortunately we are in the a world where a goat writes gay fiction ), Chase may have shared this revelation with Brandon as hopefully there is no secrets between them. If Brandon were to say something about this

crush

, don't you think it would stop Eric cold? Hopefully in enough time for Eric to get his hand off of Brandon's Little Brandon and give Brandon enough time to separate from Eric before the bikers discover them.

 

I guess we will have to wait to see what the goat has up his sleeve.....er, his fur on his foreleg .

 

Steve

 

..................I may have missed any implication of Eric's Infatuation with Brandon in the earlier series. In fact I totally missed it I think the goat is trying to tend to his minions in respect to Eric's sexuality. Leading us astray with the the tequila driven episode with his encounter with Brandon, or has he reallly crossed over to the dark side?

[Low Flyer]

Thanks for bringing this up. I was hoping someone would.

 

Okay, Brandon understands why Jim is having him take the fight to a conclusion. Bruno (the biker Brandon fought) staged a two-against one ambush on Brandon, AND used a chain. You don't do that if you just want to beat someone up. Remember also that part of the reason is to prevent a similar occurance from happening again. Chase is at risk too.

 

There was another part of this, though. You mention finding some more civilized way. Like what? If we sit and think about it, I'm sure we could come up with something, given time. However, time is the key word there, and that's what I was trying to show; the difference between hindsight and having to make an instant decision. I think it's a bit much to expect Brandon to think of some other way out instantly, as he'd have to. I wanted to show that, because it's always been a pet peeve of mine that historians tend to analyze the decisions of commanders in a battle in a similar manner; expecting them to make a careful, difficult sequence of logical deductions when an instant snap decision was all that they had time for (that's always been a pet peeve of mine regarding the historical analysis of certain battles). I'll also note that in spite of having every reason to do as Jim asked, Brandon did not take it to that level. Jim told him to break fingers, mark up Bruno's face, etc. Brandon didn't do it.

 

Hrmm, I think this means I need to explain things more in the narration when I'm trying to show something along those lines.

CJ

 

Yes, it would be unrealistic to expect Brandon to have come up with a totally different plan, and yes he didn't go as far as Jim wanted, but he went much further than was really necessary. He's already got the guy on the ground and had, for all practical purposes won his fight and thereby humiliated the biker. He could just have walked away - he could have walked back into the cabin and announced the victory.

 

Unrealistic? Possibly in the circumstances, with the adrenalin flowing, but Brandon has already demonstrated that he's not your average person. We already know that he doesn't just react to things. So, unrealistic maybe, but not impossible.

 

Either way, though, it's your story, CJ, and it's not my place to write it for you (as if I could). It's still an excellent tale, and I still want to know how it works out.

 

LF

Edited October 23, 2008 by Low Flyer

[W_L]

Yes, it would be unrealistic to expect Brandon to have come up with a totally different plan, and yes he didn't go as far as Jim wanted, but he went much further than was really necessary. He's already got the guy on the ground and had, for all practical purposes won his fight and thereby humiliated the biker. He could just have walked away - he could have walked back into the cabin and announced the victory.

 

Unrealistic? Possibly in the circumstances, with the adrenalin flowing, but Brandon has already demonstrated that he's not your average person. We already know that he doesn't just react to things. So, unrealistic maybe, but not impossible.

 

Either way, though, it's your story, CJ, and it's not my place to write it for you (as if I could). It's still an excellent tale, and I still want to know how it works out.

 

LF

 

It could have been worse; Biker's have a very rigid code of honor and breaking it could mean death even among Bikers. I think CJ had fine line with how it would work out, which is really hard to do with this story involving Bikers and gay rock stars. If it was me, I would have the homophobic guys beaten to death by their clubs for disrespecting a host and the orders of the presidents, but CJ did well to keep it less bloody and the audience a bit more respect for the Biker community.

 

Now for Eric, I actually think Chase would forgive Brandon, but he might be a bit more sensitive to Eric. I just hope CJ does not just write Eric's gay swing as a side-effect of Tequila, because Alcohol might loosen the tongue, not the pants.

 

The sexually charged scene with Eric may highlight something else about this story's focus. LTMP was about Brandon connecting into this new world of Rock music and stardom, along with the Nuclear subtext. Changing Lanes could be about the growth in Eric and a change from being a sex craze boy into some one that wants love more than just sex, along with another sub-story that deals with larger consequences of change.

[Bondwriter]

Eric's "Tequila problem" is based on me, .

Envisioning a horny goat on tequila trying to make out with passers-by just makes me shudder.

[C James]

Yes, it would be unrealistic to expect Brandon to have come up with a totally different plan, and yes he didn't go as far as Jim wanted, but he went much further than was really necessary. He's already got the guy on the ground and had, for all practical purposes won his fight and thereby humiliated the biker. He could just have walked away - he could have walked back into the cabin and announced the victory.

 

Unrealistic? Possibly in the circumstances, with the adrenalin flowing, but Brandon has already demonstrated that he's not your average person. We already know that he doesn't just react to things. So, unrealistic maybe, but not impossible.

 

Either way, though, it's your story, CJ, and it's not my place to write it for you (as if I could). It's still an excellent tale, and I still want to know how it works out.

 

LF

 

If he'd have done as you suggest, he'd have been laughed at or worse, because in their eyes he would not have won the fight. The biker had not yielded to him. Amongst bikers, Brandon either needs to make him yield, or unconscious, or dead. You don't, as a biker would say, take care of business with half-measures. Had Brandon done as you suggest, it would have, in the eyes of many of them, shown him to be weak, no resolve. He and Chase would still be at risk. Brandon hung around with bikers before joining Instinct, so he's aware of the basic dynamics.

 

Of course, staying away from the bikers might have been the more prudent move after coming out.

 

Now you';ve got me curious. My own understanding of bikers is far from complete, so maybe I'm overlooking something here. Tell ya what... next time I see one of my biker friends, I'll ask about this scenario (though minus the gay part: I'm not out to them) and see if they can think of a less violent course of action that would still work. The guys I have in mind are bikers, though not Hells Angels, but they run in those circles so I feel they'd be good ones to ask. I'd prefer to ask a real Hells Angel, but I don't know any anymore. I do however occasionally drink at a bar in Cleator (a town of about thirty people, a dirt road, and a ramshackle bar) where they sometimes hang out. I sometimes play pool with them (Bikers are GREAT pool players, by and large) and if I get the chance, I'll ask, but that likely won't be soon (more likely a month or two, as I don't go there often). I'd also only ask carefully; they don't take kindly to outsiders like me nosing around regarding the inner workings of their outfit.

 

Personally, I feel that what Brandon did, and even what Jim suggested, as actually far more humane than what "Civilized society" does. Here's why: in "civilized society" you call the cops, and the attacker is locked away in a prison cell for years. In both cases (Jim';s plan or sending the guy to prison) the actual goal is to use the culprit to set an example, a warning to others and thus a deterrent. Personally, I'd much, much rather be on the receiving end of what even Jim suggests than be put in prison for years; the kind of injuries Jim was suggesting doing were not serious; a few broken fingers and some cuts and bruises (the threat to cripple him were for Bruno's ears, not actual instructions to Brandon). The biker would have had some of his fingers in splints for a few weeks, but other than that he'd have been fine in a couple of days. The same is not true in the "Civilized" way of locking him in a cage for years.

 

Also, Bruno had just tired to kill or cripple Brandon via an ambush. Were I in Brandon's shoes, I'd have been furious, and surely done more than Brandon did. But Brandon is nicer than I am in that regard.

 

Anyway, that's my take on it, but I have an admittedly odd way of looking at things.

 

It could have been worse; Biker's have a very rigid code of honor and breaking it could mean death even among Bikers. I think CJ had fine line with how it would work out, which is really hard to do with this story involving Bikers and gay rock stars. If it was me, I would have the homophobic guys beaten to death by their clubs for disrespecting a host and the orders of the presidents, but CJ did well to keep it less bloody and the audience a bit more respect for the Biker community.

 

Now for Eric, I actually think Chase would forgive Brandon, but he might be a bit more sensitive to Eric. I just hope CJ does not just write Eric's gay swing as a side-effect of Tequila, because Alcohol might loosen the tongue, not the pants.

 

The sexually charged scene with Eric may highlight something else about this story's focus. LTMP was about Brandon connecting into this new world of Rock music and stardom, along with the Nuclear subtext. Changing Lanes could be about the growth in Eric and a change from being a sex craze boy into some one that wants love more than just sex, along with another sub-story that deals with larger consequences of change.

 

Bikers do indeed have a very rigid code, which one breaks at one's peril. They are very honorable, by their own standard. If an outsider treats them ok and shows them respect, they return it. (speaking in generalities here, of course). Some of them (by no means all) are into some very, very nasty stuff, and no, I'm not "Pro-biker" in that sense, and I certinaly don't agree with all that they do. but they are highly trustworthy and do have their good points. I'd never think twice about hiring a biker as an employee, and have done so in the past. They never let me down.

 

So, on one hand, I find them honorable and trustworthy in the main. On the other hand, they can be dangerous and into some vile things. So, I do have mixed feeling in their regard. Also, there are many kinds of bikers. Hells Angels, frankly they can make me nervous at times.

 

Heh.. One thing.. Occasionally, one of our local cowboys has a few drinks and gets it into his thick head to stroll into a bar where Bikers are and pick a fight to show how tough he is. That is not an advisable course of action, but it happens a few times a year. :wacko:

 

Brandon did indeed find himself in a very limiting situation. He had few options, none of them good.

 

I've taken some liberties with the biker club dynamics. For one thing, clubs are organized more on a business style; treasurers, vice presidents, an executive board, etc. One club I've encountered a couple of times even has a public relations officer. :wacko:

However, for simplicity I streamlined things greatly in the story.

 

I did intentionally keep Brandon's fight as "light" as I could figure out how to do, given the dynamics he was dealing with. I wanted to show that, no, even though they are being paid, all the bikers aren't going to just accept an out gay couple. I did and other things in the story to illustrate the fact that coming out, like anything, has its good points and bad. In too many gay stories, the protagonist finally comes out and everything is suddenly perfect. Life isn't like that and those kind of expectations lead to dashed hopes or worse.

 

One other thing about the bikers regarding Chase and Brandon; given the outcome of the fight, they are now relatively safe from any kind of repeat.

[TalonRider]

Now for Eric, I actually think Chase would forgive Brandon, but he might be a bit more sensitive to Eric. I just hope CJ does not just write Eric's gay swing as a side-effect of Tequila, because Alcohol might loosen the tongue, not the pants.

 

It's like they say, "Candies dandy, but liquor's quicker."

[MikeL]

..................I may have missed any implication of Eric's Infatuation with Brandon in the earlier series. In fact I totally missed it I think the goat is trying to tend to his minions in respect to Eric's sexuality. Leading us astray with the the tequila driven episode with his encounter with Brandon, or has he reallly crossed over to the dark side?

I think Eric has a problem...and it isn't tequila.

 

[Benji]

I think Eric has a problem...and it isn't tequila.

 

 

..........Well my crystal ball says Eric will have lots of problems coming up, the goat has left many traps for him in the upcoming chapters. Resolving this last one will appear to be a minor 'bump in the road'. (Hey MikeL may I borrow this?)

.............cause I did!!

[jfalkon]

Good points.

 

One thing though, how involved is Brandon with Eric? Brandon was about to say something to stop Eric when Eric's tounge intruded, lol.

Brandon then tried to push Eric away, but Brandon has bruised ribs which are by that point hindering him, plus he bumped his head on a rock, distracting him a little. Eric is also his close friend, so he was a little slow in reacting, not wanting to hurt Eric at what he knows is a delicate state in Eric's life. And how far have they gone? We don't really know, yet.

 

I used 'involved' because I couldn't think of exactly the word to describe what was going on. Eric did make it pretty difficult to get away it just seemed that some readers were blaming the whole incident on head trauma.

 

At any rate I think Eric is going to get a nasty reaction from Chase.

[MikeL]

..........Well my crystal ball says Eric will have lots of problems coming up, the goat has left many traps for him in the upcoming chapters. Resolving this last one will appear to be a minor 'bump in the road'. (Hey MikeL may I borrow this?)

.............cause I did!!

Be my guest, Benji.

 

[C James]

..........Well my crystal ball says Eric will have lots of problems coming up, the goat has left many traps for him in the upcoming chapters. Resolving this last one will appear to be a minor 'bump in the road'.

 

Hmmm? Now what problems could Eric possibly have in the future, once the current situation with Brandon (and mabe Chase) is resolved? What could possibly go wrong?

 

I used 'involved' because I couldn't think of exactly the word to describe what was going on. Eric did make it pretty difficult to get away it just seemed that some readers were blaming the whole incident on head trauma.

 

At any rate I think Eric is going to get a nasty reaction from Chase.

 

I dare not give a spoiler, or the Echidna will get me... but I can release the chapter title! It's "Morning Serenade" and will post Tuesday.

[jkeeling]

Hmmm? Now what problems could Eric possibly have in the future, once the current situation with Brandon (and mabe Chase) is resolved? What could possibly go wrong?

 

 

 

I dare not give a spoiler, or the Echidna will get me... but I can release the chapter title! It's "Morning Serenade" and will post Tuesday.

 

Now wait a minute.... I seem to remember a certain goat saying the next chapter would be up monday.

 

 

[C James]

Now wait a minute.... I seem to remember a certain goat saying the next chapter would be up monday.

 

 

 

I'll try for Monday night, but I'll be away all day monday.. So maybe I should have said we'll have the chapter by Tuesday, either monday night or Tuesday morning.